


Accidentally On Purpose

by Archangel67



Series: Destiel Week 12 [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-13
Updated: 2012-03-13
Packaged: 2017-11-01 22:06:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/361790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Archangel67/pseuds/Archangel67
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes what is best and what is asked of you are two different things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Accidentally On Purpose

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Destiel Week 12 / Day 3 / Challenge word: Serendipity

It had been months since he had heard anything. At first Dean had prayed almost constantly. Not down-on-his-knees, hands to his forehead prayer. These were more like pleas muttered into the bottom of an empty bottle. Castiel had remained as close as he could for the first few weeks, near but unseen. Watching, wanting to help but knowing that this was what Sam had wanted for his brother. He wasn’t willing to go against the last wishes of a man who had been brave and faithful enough to cast himself into Hell for the betterment of the world.

If Sam thought that Dean was better off in this house, with this woman and her child, so be it.

Unfortunately duty had conflicted with desire and it wasn’t long before he was forced to return to Heaven, to sort things out. Michael was gone. Michael, who had stepped in to take over when God had turned his back on all of them. Michael, who had wanted destruction because in destruction he saw a twisted version of peace.

Now and again, between gathering followers and getting his celestial teeth kicked in by Raphael, he had heard one of those whispered, choked out bottle-prayers. But he didn’t go. He was afraid that the moment he returned and tried to console the hunter that his already shaky conviction would shatter and he would stay. It would have been difficult to explain to the woman why Dean had an angel literally watching over him.

Was that what he really wanted? That simple, quiet life? Maybe it was for the best…

Castiel had decided that he would visit just once. Before he dedicated himself fully to the war. Raphael was far stronger than he and had the benefit of the Host’s loyalty to the chain of command. Only rogues and traitors were willing to side with him, but Castiel imagined that he was a traitor himself. He had no place judging the mindset of others. All he could do was to tell himself that his intentions were purer than those of the first angel who had gone against God.

The little blue house stood silent, no car in the driveway and no lights on within. If not for the visceral pull of silent, desperate prayer within, he would have thought that the house lay vacant. One moment he stood on the front porch. The next he was just inside, the street lamp which shone through the window casting his shadow in dark relief against the white wall.

He was nothing like Lucifer, no matter what the morning star said, Castiel found himself thinking. A desire to see Heaven set right was not rebellious. It was forthright. He was doing the right thing.

The angel made no sound as he moved past the kitchen, blue eyes catching on glossy photographs of the woman, the boy, and Dean secured to the refrigerator with magnets. Brow furrowing, Castiel frowned. He looked… happy. Or at least he was feigning an expression of happiness, mouth turning up although Dean’s eyes did not show the same sentiment.

He had only ever acted selflessly, he argued internally as he left the photograph behind and continued down the hall way. The doors of the rooms that lay along the stretch were all wide open, revealing empty rooms. All save for the door at the very end, which was solidly shut. Castiel reached out, fingers closing around the cold brass knob as he slowly entered the room. The prayer had been growing weaker as he came closer, which was the opposite of how it usually felt.

Weaker, as if Dean were falling asleep. Weaker and suddenly gone. As if…

An unexpected, painful tightness in his chest stopped Castiel cold, leaving him hovering in the doorway. The hunter laid with his body propped limply against the corner of the room near an open window, a nearly empty liquor bottle gripped loosely in one hand. On the nightstand, a nearly empty pill bottle, at least a dozen of the small white capsules sacrificed to the floor where Dean must have spilled them in his haste. Everything the man did was sloppy, poorly planned. Why would this be any different?

Slowly he crossed over to Dean, kneeling down at the man’s side and reaching to hesitantly touch his wrist. He was still warm, but those green eyes were glassy and looking up into the nothingness of the white ceiling as his head lulled back into the wall. The bottle was turned at such an angle that some of the alcohol had spilled out, leaving a dark whiskey-colored stain on the tan carpet. Plucking the bottle from easily unfurling digits, the angel set it aside and pursed his lips as his eyes searched those of his friend.

“Thought this was what you wanted,” he murmured as his fingers grazed over the edge of Dean’s jaw before settling on his forehead.

People seemed to believe that the soul left the body immediately upon death, but that wasn’t strictly true. There was a sort of life line. A cord which held the soul in place and which stretched as far as it could before it inevitably snapped. This cord was the same reason why some humans could have so-called out of body experiences. Dean’s cord had been stretched quite thin, but in this moment it had yet to severe.

Castiel supposed it was serendipitous that he had come tonight. The hunter didn’t realize the sort of damage that he would have caused if he had freed his soul from the shackles of mortal life. He would have made quite the pawn for Raphael to play against Castiel. This was no happy reunion, but the angel had never expected it to be.

Instead of having to explain his decision to stay away to a conscious Dean, he instead had to breathe life back into the man. It was admittedly easier to talk to someone who couldn’t argue with him about his choices.

“No. This isn’t what you want at all, is it?” he asked rhetorically as he closed his eyes and concentrated. The previously still, quickly cooling body lurched, arching away from the wall. Dean began coughing violently, doubling over as Castiel drew himself back to his feet. The hunter scrambled on hands and knees to the window, clutching at the sill as he retched violently out into the bushes below. Panting, he sunk back down to the carpet, hanging his head.

“Cas - ” His voice was raw, throat torn by the abuse he had put it through.

“Don’t make me have to do this again. You’ve been given more chances than most. Try to show some gratitude.” Perhaps his reply was gruffer than it should have been. Square jawed and sharp eyed in the dim light, he wasn’t surprised that Dean’s reaction was to stare blankly up at him. The hunter’s head was beginning to ache, his stomach would feel like it had gone through a blender, but he was _alive_.

“I didn’t mean to…”

“Yes. You did.”

Dean looked away, guilt etched into the weary lines around his eyes. The angel knew that he was taking a risk, but he couldn’t allow the hunter to remember that had had been here. Dean had to learn how to live like this, away from the danger that had been haunting his every step from the time he was a child. Without his brother, he wasn’t really living, though. He was only going through the motions of living without forming any meaningful connection to anyone or anything.

This would happen again and again if Castiel didn’t find a way to stop it.

“You got me out of Hell. Why not Sammy? Isn’t he special enough?” Dean asked quietly, unable or unwilling to suppress a sneer that quirked the edge of his lips. “Or do you all think he’s better off, stuck down there, so long as Lucifer is out of the picture?”

“You know I don’t feel that way,” he growled. “Legions of angels were involved in your rescue. They’re not on my side now. If only they were. I can’t do it on my own, Dean. I’m not strong enough to bring him out in one piece. You’re allowing your emotions to cloud your judgment.”

“At least I have emotions,” Dean snapped.

Castiel looked away, drawing a difficult breath. It went against all of his better instincts, but he wanted to make Dean happy. It was irresponsible, short sighted, and suicidal. His voice was flat when he replied:

“I’ll do what I can to bring him back.”

Still sitting against the wall, the hunter looked surprised. He hadn’t been expecting to get his way, but he should have realized by this point that Castiel was willing to do anything that the man asked of him… no matter how idiotic or dangerous. Dean’s problems always came first.

“R-really?”

“Yes, but… I’m sorry, Dean.”

“Why?”

Castiel’s finger tips touched briefly to the hunter’s forehead and Dean’s eyes fluttered, rolling back into his head. The woman would find him later, sprawled on the floor with the pills and the bottle of booze. She would rush him to the hospital to have his stomach pumped and she would scream at him for being irresponsible. She would tell him how hard she tried to make him happy. How hard it was to let him back into her life – into the boy’s life. She would cry.

She would cry and Dean would feel guilt and he would try to change.

She would cry and he would learn how to stop drinking, how to use a grill, how to mow the lawn. He wouldn’t be anything like his father. He would teach the boy how to work on a car and how to shave. He would never let the boy touch a gun. And one day, soon, his brother would come walking through that door.

But Dean wouldn’t remember that Castiel had made the promise. There would be no recollection that the angel had nearly been destroyed, one spot of light in the darkness, when he raised Sam. Everything would be set right and the boys would get to live their happily ever after. Maybe in time they would completely forget that Castiel had ever existed.

Maybe it would have been better that way… but things never quite work out the way you want them to. Sometimes even angels let sentiment get the best of them.


End file.
